


Downtime

by Laylah



Category: Shin Megami Tensei: Strange Journey
Genre: Bloodplay, Knifeplay, M/M, POV Second Person, Status Effects
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-03-30
Updated: 2010-03-30
Packaged: 2017-10-08 13:18:54
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,266
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/76042
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Laylah/pseuds/Laylah
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Wait," you say, but you're slow off the mark or he's in a hurry, or both, and he's already tapping one fingertip experimentally against the knife point. He's got really nice hands. That's not something you ought to notice.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Downtime

If soldiering is ninety-five percent boredom and five percent terror, the way they say it is, then you probably have a good ten years of nothing but boredom owed to you by now. Most likely, the debt's going to get worse before it gets better, too -- when Terry and the engineering crew get the motor up and running so you can shift out, the odds are damn good you're heading further _in_ to trouble before you come out again.

While you wait, there's time to get working on at least a little of that boredom backlog. The ship's a bit too cramped to make good living quarters, but you're the hero of the strike team, somehow, and the rest of them give you space. You're killing time in one of the traditional ways. If you had a deck of cards, you might go find Dent and play a few hands, but failing that you've still got your gear. Jimenez gives you crap about being a by-the-book kind of guy, but at least you can be sure you can count on your gear to hold together when you're out there.

Cleaning the guns came first, because that's tricky, detail-focused stuff, especially with these new models Irving and Chen have come up with. Sure, the basic idea's the same, but every gun has her own little quirks, and you don't know these ones as well as you'd like to. Yet. You'll get there. And doing it keeps you calm, helps you get some perspective back. This isn't the first war zone you've seen. It won't be the last.

Okay, probably it's the creepiest.

Still, you'll pull through. Not everybody's going to make it -- even apart from the ones who've already gone down, you can tell some of them aren't going to hold up under the strain if you're stuck in the Schwarzwelt for long. But you're not going to be one of the guys who crack.

You're halfway through sharpening your knives -- if this keeps up, you're going to have enough of a collection to retire to a nice cushy life as a serial killer when you make it out of here -- when Jimenez shows up.

"Man, don't you _ever_ take a minute off?" he says.

You put down the nasty little blade Chen designed for you, glance up at Jimenez and then down at your gear again. "Nice to see you, too."

Jimenez snorts, dropping into an easy crouch and looking interested in your blades. "Just asking," he says. "Don't have to give me that stick up your ass crap. There's more to you than that, right?"

"Could be," you say, reaching for your last knife. The lab crew didn't make this one. It's a weird little thing with a snaky, curving blade that shimmers blue, looks more like some kind of fantasy prop than a real weapon.

"That one ain't standard issue," Jimenez says.

"Nope," you agree. "Got it off this little fairy down in the ice caves." You glance up, and Jimenez is looking at you funny, like he's trying to figure out whether he should say something obnoxious about it. Or _what_ he should say, more likely. Well, he can work that out by himself. You test the edge of the blade with your thumb. "Not much of an edge on it, though."

"Nah. It's not really made for that, is it?" he says. "It's for sticking in things."

Your turn to look at Jimenez -- _maybe_ he didn't mean for that to sound as bad as it did -- but he's not even smirking as he reaches for the knife. Not smirking any more than usual, anyway. Sometimes it seems like he never quits. You flip the blade around for him to take, and as he grabs the handle the point scrapes across your palm. It still barely stings, and Jimenez must not notice, because he's reaching to test it himself.

"Wait," you say, but you're slow off the mark or he's in a hurry, or both, and he's already tapping one fingertip experimentally against the knife point. He's got really nice hands. That's not something you ought to notice.

"Something wrong?" he says. You hold up your hand to show him the scratch. He rolls his eyes. "What, you going to tell me you didn't get checked out by a whole platoon of doctors before they put you on this mission?" he says. "You got something I can catch?"

You shake your head. "I'm clean. As far as I know, anyway."

"Right. And you'd have to take your suit off to catch something in here, and you're not that kind of guy," Jimenez says.

The answer he's probably expecting is _Of course not_, but you also consider _Don't be so sure about that_ for a second before you go with, "If that's the kind of thing you're doing with your demons, I don't want to hear about it."

Jimenez laughs, like you've surprised him. It's a really nice laugh. That's not something you ought to notice either. "Man, I like to think I'm adventurous, but that's just plain kinky." He pokes the tip of the knife into his palm a couple more times and shakes his head. "I don't know how you did that, even. This thing's completely dull."

That's weird -- it was definitely sharp enough to scratch you just a minute ago. You reach for the knife. "Let me see." Your fingers brush his as Jimenez hands the knife back to you. They're warm, despite the cold in here, and that feels good. Then the knife kind of..._twists_ in your hand, or something, and just that easy you open up a neat little scratch on the back of Jimenez's hand.

"Shit," he says, but he sounds like he's ready to laugh it off. "It wasn't that sharp a second ago." He flexes his hand, and tiny beads of blood rise up along the cut.

Your cock gets hard quick as flipping a switch.

"Yeah," you say. "It's definitely weird." Probably you should keep talking -- tell him how messed up your head feels all of a sudden, give him a chance to clear off and maybe even let sick bay know. You don't. You get him by the wrist and lean down to lick those drops of blood off his hand.

Jimenez hisses, and his other hand gets you by the scruff of the neck -- not to pull you back but to keep you there. "Don't fucking tease," he says, raw.

You bite the loose skin of the back of his hand. It's a shallow cut, doesn't bleed much even with the encouragement, but the sound he makes is just as good. His skin tastes powdery from the inside of the Demonica's gloves.

"Come here," he says. You look up. Jesus, you could get lost in his eyes.

"I want more," you warn him, and he nods.

He doesn't try to stop you when you shove him back against the wall. Stop you, hell, he's got both hands in your jumpsuit pulling you closer. The kiss is his idea, but you'd have to admit it's a good one. His lips are soft and warm, his goatee is just a little bit rough, and he bites when you push your tongue into his mouth. You bring the knife up to lay the blade across his throat -- the way he wears his suit open is like an invitation, right?

And it makes him groan, so you'd bet that's a yes. You drag another shallow line across his collarbone, and he shudders like you hit him with a taser.

"Get this out of the way," you tell him, pulling at the unfastened collar of his suit. The undershirts they gave all of you are soft microfiber stuff that's supposed to pull moisture away from skin. It'd swallow the blood right up, and there isn't much of it to begin with.

"Me?" Jimenez says, as he unseals his suit the rest of the way and drags his zipper further down. He pushes you back so he'll have room to move. "What about you, mister semper fi? You need to loosen up a lot more than I do."

You'd argue, but the idea of skin on skin right now has a kind of _urgency_ to it that your arguments can't resist. Jimenez is peeling his shirt open, shrugging out of it. He has more tattoos under there. The arch of spiky script under his rib cage ought to be touched. Now. You unseal your suit and push it down off your shoulders, get your own high-tech microfiber out of the way. The air's chilly against your skin, but who cares?

Jimenez looks you up and down. "Not bad," he says, "but you really need some color." He reaches for the pixie's knife. You let him take it.

It feels better when you're expecting it. He sweeps the blade in a smooth curve up your chest. It stings, and then the sting turns into warmth. Your cock aches. The hungry look in his eyes is gorgeous.

He draws a few more lines, then hooks his fingers in your belt to drag you close enough to taste. His tongue swipes along the cuts and you moan.

You snag the knife back while he's distracted. His back isn't marked up. You fix that, tracing the curves of his shoulder blades, smearing the blood that wells up -- it's dark when it beads in the cuts, but it's bright red against your fingers.

Jimenez is working his pants open. He's got a good idea there. You have to let the knife go to follow suit, but somehow you think you'll live. He gets _you_ up against the wall this time, and it's cold against your back but he's hot against your chest and you're both sticky with blood. It feels good.

You get your suit pushed down all the way to your thighs and Jimenez presses close against you and _that's_ what you wanted: smooth skin and coarse hair and the rough spots of Jimenez's gun calluses as he catches hold of your cock. "I'm not really into this," he says as he leans into you, and you could take a few guesses what he means -- blood, pain, cock, fraternizing with uptight assholes like you -- but you let it go.

"It's this place," you say. "Messing with us." You shove your hand down there to help out, trapping his cock against yours, catching hold of his hand.

"Just this once, I ain't complaining," he says.

You nod. "Just this once." His hips rock, and the friction's just about the best thing that's happened since you got called up for this mission in the first place. You bite down on his shoulder, hard. He growls, and his free hand comes up to grab you by the hair. He pulls pretty hard, but you don't let that stop you. It all feels good right now, the pain and the blood sticking you together and the roughness of his hand on your cock. Especially that last part.

"Son of a bitch," Jimenez says, not like he's pissed at you, just like he's losing control. You jerk him off harder -- maybe it's kind of macho bullshit, getting hung up on who comes first, but what the hell. You're both wound pretty tight right now.

He muffles his curses against your throat when he comes. His breath is hot, the sounds fierce. His hand in your hair pulls tighter.

You have his come on your hand. For some reason it seems like the most natural thing in the world to bring it up to your mouth and taste that, too. "Jesus Christ," he says when you do.

_Your blood tastes better_, you could say, or maybe, _Too much for you to handle?_ but he hasn't stopped jerking you off and what you really want is for him to keep it up for just a few more seconds -- so you just close your eyes and lean back against the wall, pushing into his hand, and let it happen.

It only takes two, maybe three deep breaths after you're done before the world sort of snaps back into focus, starts to make sense again. Jimenez is watching you when you open your eyes. "Pretty freaky shit going on here," he says.

You nod. You can remember what you were just doing -- what you were just thinking, _wanting_ \-- but it doesn't feel like it was you at all. "Over now, though," you say, because making a big deal out of it will really only make it worse.

Jimenez laughs. "You're crazy, man," he says. "Fucking stone cold."

You'll take that as a compliment. "If this is the worst this place does to us," you say, "then we'll be getting off easy."

"Fair," Jimenez says. He looks down at the pixie's knife, on the floor next to you. It doesn't _look_ like the kind of thing that could fuck your head up that badly. "Still might want to find someplace safe to put that thing so you don't have any more accidents with it."

"Right," you say. And then because the chance is there and he doesn't have you figured out as well as he thinks he does, you add, "Does this mean we can't go for round two in the showers?"

His eyes go wide and you can't quite keep a straight face. "Crazy son of a bitch," he says, but he's smiling back as he shakes his head.

Yeah, you'll make it. This place isn't going to take you down.


End file.
